Recently I had occasion to be in Michigan and it provided a great opportunity to check out Bad Brads BBQ in New Baltimore Michigan.

The building is just terrific and I sure wished it was a lot warmer so we could have sat on their incredible back patio. It has a fireplace, a pond and a while lot of appeal !

Everywhere in the restaurant there is a concerted effort to make it interesting warm and appealing. I have to say the decor is just really great. I think its a fine line in BBQ joints. They have done a really fantastic job in this BBQ joint.
From the inlaid wood tables that have a great look to them, to the attractive bar and the wood piles outside they have paid attention to a lot of details.

However with even those great details the show stopper has to be the incredible murals that are a bbq carnivores version of a Picasso or a Rembrandt— pictures of meat cuts on the brick walls and knives painted on the brick facings all over the restaurant. I loved these.

More importantly though I think have paid close attention to the main meats. We ordered a sample platter of sausage, brisket, chicken, cornbread, collard greens, and potato salad served with warm tortillas.

The chicken was really moist and tender and there was a generous amount for the platter. I personally think it needed more oomph (just my preference) but that was easily remedied by using one of the many great sauces that is on every table. I really liked the spicy one. It had great depth and was full of many layers of flavor. All of the sauces were interesting and full of flavor.
The potato salad for me was just fine. Nothing to knock your socks off but nothing bad about it either. Just a really decent potato salad with good texture.

The sausage I have to admit I tried it twice and I did not like it at all. It was the only item that we tried that I really was disappointed about. I have eaten sausages all over the place from Texas to Canada and everywhere in between and these were just not good in my opinion. The texture was too fine and all you could taste was vegetable. You could not taste any pork. I wasn’t the only one in our party that thought this. We all did. One of my dining partners even pointed out that the sausages tasted like a vegetable mirepoix before you add the bread to make stuffing. When you expect a pork sausage you should be able to taste the pork. Sadly these were lacking. They looked really good too. Terrific color and they had that really nice snap when you bit into them – Such a shame they coulda been a contender…….

Let me just say this I love collard/turnip greens. I love it when its done right and the balance of the vinegars and the greens marries. It can be a little bowl of heaven when that happens. These were almost there. The only thing is that I got to crunch (yes crunch) on some tough beans in the collard greens. Ugh. They need to take those beans out or cook them properly and let the greens with the lovely striations of meat weaved through them shine. Pretty simple fix.

Moving on to brisket. It was delicious. It was smoky and tender but not too tender and God bless them they left some of the decadent fat on the brisket slices. I thoroughly enjoyed the brisket slices. They were wonderful. Absolutely a must have for anyone going there.

Additionally a must have would be their cornbread with the whipped BBQ butter. It was glorious and tender and just sweet enough and just crumbly enough and it is probably one of the all time best cornbreads I have ever had. It was like your Grandma had just made it for you out of her 50 year old cast iron pan. I liked it so much I ordered another. It was that good. Don’t miss out on their cornbread.

I like this restaurant. I liked it a lot- from the stacks of wood outside to the BBQ smells coming from the kitchen. I like the way the it feels and the food and all of the things that make a good BBQ joint in my opinion this place has. I look forward to going back and having their ribs and pulled pork more brisket and of course their to die for cornbread. Make sure you stop in if you are in the area. Its worth the drive.